Sigi Schmid on becoming a grandfather, Estrada’s recovery, MLS 36 and more

UPDATE 5:53 p.m. — The weight of baby Reagan Marie has been corrected.

Here are a few more notes from Sounders FC coach Sigi Schmid after Friday’s practice:

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Rumors abound that you’re a grandfather? “Yes I am,” Schmid confirmed with a proud smile. “My son Kurt and his wife, Joanne, had a baby girl, Reagan Marie. What was she? Ten pounds, seven ounces. [Ed note: the baby’s weight was 10 pounds, 0.7 ounces] So watch out Abby (Wambach). We have a new center forward in the making.”

David Estrada is at about Week 8 in what was called an 8-12 week recovery from the broken foot. How is he doing? “He’s making progress,” Schmid said. “His running is getting better. They’ve still got him on the (anti-gravity) treadmill, but I think he’s getting very close to running on his body weight and not having any issues with it. He’s such a fitness machine that I know he’s worked hard on that aspect of it. It’s a matter of him getting cleared on the field, and after he starts training on the field, I think a week to 10 days and he should be very close to ready.”

Do you watch the MLS 36 episode on Fredy Montero? How do you think you came off? “Usually my halftime talks are very clean,” said a smiling Schmid in reference to a bleep-heavy halftime speech covered in the episode, “and this just happened to be one where there were a few expletives. But it is what it is. I’m an emotional person in the sense of I’m passionate about the game, so we got in there and you take four goals in a half and I’m not going to be happy. Obviously that came to the forefront. Sometimes you’ve got to challenge people and I think that came to the forefront, as well. Hopefully people are focusing on Fredy and not me.”

Any thoughts on the new MLS tiebreakers (Seattle, Vancouver and L.A. are currently tied for third in the West)? “It’s the tiebreaker they decided to use, so a team like L.A. that scores a lot of goals and gives up a lot of goals gains an advantage. So you can actually have a negative goal-differential and you could be seeded ahead of somebody you’re tied with because you’ve scored more goals. Obviously that’s the emphasis the league wants to put on it, but it’s not going to change how we approach it on a game-by-game basis. For us right now, the important thing is points and not to being tied with anybody. These are three very important points (Saturday against the Whitecaps). It’s a West Coast team. It’s a rival. It’s a six-point game. We’re tied with them right now and we’ve got some games in hand, but if we can get a three-point cushion and keep those games in hand, it makes it all the better.”